Assistant Director, Civic and Student Engagement

Department
 

President IOP: Civic Engagement

About the Department
 

Created in 2013 by University of Chicago alumnus David Axelrod (AB'76), the nonpartisan Institute of Politics is committed to fostering in our students a passion for public service, meaningful dialogue and active engagement in our democracy. By bringing practitioners from the public arena to campus, and providing extracurricular opportunities in politics, policy, government and journalism, the non-partisan Institute seeks to open pathways for engagement and leadership to students across campus. This is done through the four primary programmatic components of the Institute. The Speaker Series program hosts nationally and internationally recognized speakers on a wide variety of issues related to the mission of the IOP. The Fellows Program presents an opportunity for political practitioners, policy makers, journalists, and others engaged in politics and public service, to be in residence at the University of Chicago for an academic quarter and provide weekly, extracurricular seminars to University of Chicago students. The IOP also sponsors a robust, paid internship program for undergraduate and graduate students, placing them in high-level settings overseas, in Washington, D.C. and at the state and local levels. Lastly, the IOP’s Civic Engagement programs provide pathways for students to take an active role in shaping politics and policy in their communities through leadership development programs, student-led civic engagement projects, and political exploration treks.

Job Summary
 

The Assistant Director of Civic and Student Engagement works closely with students and the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to provide key support to the IOP’s Civic Engagement programs. They design leadership development curriculum and develop program assessments and evaluations, track metrics for the Civic Engagement program, manage student-led event planning and RSVP processes for Civic Engagement workshops and events, perform budget and purchasing-related activities, and perform venue and travel booking arrangements when appropriate.

Responsibilities

• Student Group Advising and Project Management - oversees and supports student-led groups by advising on strategy and execution of their program plans; conducts regular check-in meetings; tracks the progress of student group goals (for The Gate, Leaders of Color, TechTeam, W+, and other student initiatives). Advises and serves as staff liaison to the IOP’s student advisory board. 
• Mentorship - builds rapport with student leaders and civic engagement students; serves as a student facing IOP staff resource for all interested University of Chicago students; plans and executes orientation and onboarding programs for new IOP students. 
• Budget and Operations - administers, tracks, and reconciles Civic Engagement budget; troubleshoots administrative and technical questions; works with Finance Intern to administer check reimbursements; assists student leaders with access to resources such as venue reservation and third-party purchases; oversees and enforces IOP policies for space reservation and third-party purchases for student-led groups and IOP staff who work with student-led groups. 
• Leadership Development - works with the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to envision, design, and implement signature leadership development programming for highly engaged students at the IOP. This includes advising the IOP’s student advisory board and creating integrative leadership development training and experiences for all highly engaged students for IOP students to strengthen their leadership skills.  
• Democratic Engagement - leads student voter engagement strategy, operations, and advising. Develops and maintains partnerships with national student voting organizations. Advises and supports peer-led nonpartisan voter engagement group, UChiVotes.  
• Evaluations - works with the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to administer and analyze evaluations of Civic Engagement programming; works with the Director to write summaries and reports of Civic Engagement programming for external and internal audiences. 
• Data - maintains data about student engagement in the Civic Engagement Program; updates CRM. 
• Project Management - works with the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to track progress on all Civic Engagement programming and projects to ensure that the CE Program is executing its program goals in a timely manner. 
• Team Management - works with the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to manage the student team (two Civic Engagement interns and 1-2 Student Advisory Board Civic Engagement chair(s)). 
• IOP Collaboration - works with the Director of Civic and Student Engagement to coordinate outreach and highlight CE programming with the Communications team;